The approval is tightened, and the "subway dream" in many places is stranded

There is no need to build a subway at all in many cities

Recently, a public response from the Weifang City Transportation Bureau of Shandong Province has broken the "subway dream" of many citizens.

In response to the consultation of "whether Weifang meets the conditions for building subway", the Weifang Transportation Bureau recently replied on the official website that urban rail transit still implements strict control policies in September 2021. Essence

In June last year, some citizens asked "when will the Hengyang Cloud Rail open", and the Hunan Provincial Development and Reform Commission replied that the country's current strict control of urban rail transit construction has not accepted the application for launching the planning of urban rail transit construction.

It is not difficult to see that the two replies conveys the same information: the state's approval is tightened, and the subway declaration of general prefecture -level cities will not be accepted.

According to the statistics of the China Municipal Rail Transit Association, as of now, a total of 51 cities in China have opened the operation of urban rail transit lines, most of which are subway lines, including 4 major municipalities, 5 planned cities, 23 provincial capital cities (Haikou, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa, Lhasa. , Xining and Yinchuan have not built subways due to the small population scale), as well as economic cities such as Suzhou, Wuxi, Dongguan, and Foshan.

After the Baotou subway was suspended in August 2017, there was no first round of rail transit construction plan for the city's rail transit.

In this context, for many cities with "subway dreams", does the plan to build the subway really become far away?

Multi -city planning is stranded

It is understood that the urban rail transit (subway) lines planned by Weifang City have been conducted in 2015, which have been carried out in the early stage planning, feasibility study and survey design. Approve.

In Shandong, in addition to Weifang, there is also a large economic market Yantai. Since 2009, Yantai has been deploying rail transit construction, but it has not seen the hope of approval until this year.

Prior to this, the subway project of Inner Mongolia Baotou, which had been approved, and the light rail project of Shaanxi Baoji, was also stopped and proactively suspended, respectively.

Weifang city scenery. Figure/Figure insect creativity

In August 2017, the Baotou subway, which started construction less than a hundred days, was suspended due to debt issues and financial risks in construction. This is also considered by the outside world to tighten the earliest signal of tightening urban rail transit approval.

It is worth noting that from the official statements of the above two places, it is not only the first round of subway declarations in ordinary prefecture -level cities, and cities that have built subways must also strictly control the approval of a new round of construction planning.

It is understood that in some cities with subways, the new subway planning lines have also shrunk significantly. For example, in the new round of planning, Sichuan Chengdu reduced rail transit lines from 55 to 36; the latest subway lines planned by Nanning, Guangxi have also decreased significantly compared to before.

As the third city of Zhejiang, Wenzhou has been planning to build rail transit (that is, subway) construction in the city's express rail "S" line (that is, the city railway), but it has not been approved so far.

Cheng Shidong, director of the Urban Transport Research Center of the National Development and Reform Commission, said that compared with the past two years, the construction and approval construction of subway approval has shown an orderly development trend in the past two years, and has gone through the peak period of approval and construction in previous years.

He told China News Weekly that the state's indicators for urban subway planning and construction have been adjusted in 2018, including GDP, fiscal revenue, urban population, passenger volume, etc. all have clear standards. "If these requirements are not met, they will definitely not be approved," he said.

Take Weifang as an example. In 2021, the city's GDP reached 7010.06 billion yuan, and fiscal revenue was 65.69 billion yuan, which far exceeded the standards prescribed by the country. Essence

According to Zhao Jian, a professor at Beijing Jiaotong University, there is no need to build a subway at all. He told China News Weekly that the subway is not only very high in construction, but also has a high operating cost after completion. Many cities have insufficient population, and local fiscal revenue is very small. Even if the subway is built, the finances cannot afford.

Tighten the back of the examination

The "indicators" mentioned by Cheng Shidong originated from the "Opinions on Further Strengthening the Management of Urban Rail Transit Planning Construction" (hereinafter referred to as "Opinions") issued by the State Council in July 2018.

According to the "Opinions", the urban GDP that declares the construction of the subway should be more than 300 billion yuan, the fiscal revenue is more than 30 billion yuan, and the urban resident population is more than 3 million; The income is more than 15 billion yuan, and the resident population in the urban area is more than 1.5 million.

Prior to this, the "bottom line" of urban GDP and fiscal revenue that declared the construction of the subway was 100 billion yuan and 10 billion yuan, respectively. The "Opinions" has raised local GDP and fiscal revenue indicators to the original three times the subway approval.

In addition, in terms of passenger flow, the "Opinions" clearly explicitly planned to build subways and light rails at the initial stage of not less than 7,000 per kilometers per kilometer, and 44,000 people. More than 10,000 people.

According to data in 2021, only 9 cities in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Chengdu, Chongqing, Hangzhou, Xi'an, and Changsha were opened in cities. No standards.

This is undoubtedly difficult to reach for cities with less population, insufficient population, and insufficient commuting demand. According to the "China Business Daily" report, during the "14th Five -Year Plan" period, the National Development and Reform Commission will further refine the conditions for approval of urban rails and do not accept the first round of construction planning of cities and general prefecture -level cities. If the post -passenger flow does not meet the standard, the new round of construction plan cannot be reported.

Some analysts believe that this means that cities without subway or light rails are difficult to obtain construction qualifications in the short term, and cities with subway have not reached the standard of passenger flow, the possibility of expansion of subway road networks in the future is very small.

Wang Shouqing, chief expert of the Tsinghua University PPP Research Center, believes that the country's strict control of local rail transit construction is related to the use efficiency of the subway, such as insufficient passenger flow; on the other hand, it is related to local financial resources and debt issues.

In fact, debt issues and operating pressure have become a topic that has been inseparable from the urban rail transit industry in recent years.

Building a subway requires huge financial support. At present, the general view of the industry is that the average cost of the subway is about 700 million yuan/kilometer. It takes tens of billions of billions of subways to build a subway, and the maintenance cost after completion is not low.

Data show that in addition to Shenzhen in China, subway companies have received high subsidies in 2021. The subsidy quota of Suzhou, Qingdao, and Chengdu is 6 billion to 7 billion yuan, and subsidies obtained by subway companies in cities such as Ningbo, Nanjing, Changsha, Tianjin and other cities are 3. billion to 4.6 billion yuan. In addition, the subsidies received by urban subway companies such as Chongqing, Xiamen, Xi'an, Nanchang, and Wuxi are also more than 1 billion yuan.

In other words, the subways of most cities need huge financial subsidies. As for the "most profitable" Shenzhen Metro, the main source of revenue is not a ticket, but an investment income in real estate, land and property income, which accounts for more than 70%of the revenue.

Cheng Shidong said that the subway itself is a kind of public welfare infrastructure, including operations and the category of basic public services. "The loss of the subway is normal and the characteristics of the industry."

Some analysts believe that in recent years, some cities have insufficient understanding of the objective laws of urban rail transit development, do not grasp the actual needs and their own strength, and have problems such as excessive advancement, too concentrated construction, and inadequate fiscal funds. To a certain extent, to a certain extent Increased local debt burden.

Expert: Do it for effort

In Cheng Shidong's view, in the future application of the subway, it is necessary to dilute the administrative color and highlight the demand itself. "The city's demand should not be built, and we must do it." He said.

Zhao Jian believes that whether a city to build a subway depends on the development of the city. He said that the problem of urban transportation is actually a problem of urban planning. For cities, the construction of the subway is closely related to the development of the city.

He said that the urban planning and rail transit construction of many cities is a "two skin", "the density of urban construction is average, not gathered along the rail transit, so people travel is not convenient. question".

In Cheng Shidong's view, cities should consider their own economic strength. From a scientific perspective, according to the population and passenger volume of the city, the most reasonable transportation method is selected.

He said that what kind of transportation method to choose must be determined based on the intensity of passenger flow. This is the most fundamental; then according to the financial situation of the city, "on the one hand, it depends on the demand, and on the other hand, it depends on the strength of the funds." "For example, if the passenger flow is large, you need to collect intensive travel methods, you can choose ground buses, or even special buses; if you still cannot meet the needs, you may consider the fast bus system (BRT) or light rail; You need to build a subway, "he said.

So, there are no cities that have not been qualified for subway construction so far, will it really miss the "subway dream" completely?

From the perspective of industry experts, it is not completely without a chance. Zhao Jian said that this requires the development of the city. Cities with more than 5 million people have a relatively larger opportunity, and the urban opportunities with a small population are relatively small, but it is not impossible.

Cheng Shidong said that there is a clear standard for the country to build a subway in cities. The National Development and Reform Commission also conducts approval in accordance with the corresponding standards. If it meets the corresponding standards, there will be opportunities in the future.

Some analysts pointed out that with the development of economic and social, more general prefecture -level cities meet the standards. For example, if Weifang, if the urban resident population can reach the standard of 3 million, it does not rule out the possibility of approval in the future. Other cities are also the same.

In addition, with the advent of the urban circle, some subway projects in the central city can "transform" the intercity railway when crossing the city. This is the opportunity of general prefecture -level cities.

For example, the Guangzhou Metro Line 18 and Line 28 submitted approval as the intercity railway of the Greater Bay District and have been approved.

Guangzhou Metro Line 18 and Line 28 are called "cross -city subways", and now the part of the cross -city is changed to intercity railway. The approval of these two intercity railways means that general prefecture -level cities such as Zhongshan, Zhuhai, Qingyuan, Dongguan, and Huizhou also have urban rail transit.

According to the "Guangdong -Hong Kong -Macao Greater Bay Area Intercity Railway Construction Plan", which was officially approved by the National Development and Reform Commission in August 2020, Line 18 runs through four cities: Guangzhou, Zhongshan, Zhuhai, and Qingyuan (to be approved)., Guangzhou, Dongguan, Huizhou (branch line connecting), are known as the "Bay Area vertical axis" and "Bay Area horizontal axis".Therefore, for the general prefecture -level cities in the Dadu Circle, you can also extend through the central city subway network to achieve your own "subway dream".

Author: Sun Xiaobo ([email protected])

Edit: Cai Rupeng

Operation editor: Wang Lin

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